Worldfocus.org presents a webcasted radio show on Gaza with the help of BlogTalkRadio.

Worldfocus.org and anchor Martin Savidge host a panel featuring a range of voices and perspectives on Gaza, addressing questions submitted by Worldfocus viewers:

Ehud Eiran is a research fellow at the Belfer Center’s International Security Program at Harvard University. Prior to his studies, Eiran served as an officer in the Israeli Army and is currently a reserve major. He was a legal clerk for two Israeli attorney generals and assistant to Prime Minister Ehud Barak’s Foreign Policy Advisor.

Wendy Pearlman is a political science professor at Northwestern University specializing in Palestinian politics. She is currently finishing a book that examines fragmentation and violence in the history of the Palestinian national movement. She is the author of “Occupied Voices: Stories of Everyday Life from the Second Intifada.”

Ghassan Shabaneh is a professor of Middle East and international studies at Marymount Manhattan College. During his career, Mr. Shabaneh has done extensive field research in the Middle East, and most recently in the West Bank, Syria and Jordan. He is currently working on a book tentatively called “The Role of the United Nations in State Building: The Case of Palestine.” Watch his previous interviews on the Worldfocus newscast.

Charles D. Smith is a professor of Middle East history at the University of Arizona. He has written extensively on the Arab-Israeli conflict and is the author of “Palestine and the Arab-Israeli Conflict,” currently in its seventh edition. He is a former president of the American Research Center in Egypt and a former research fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He has lived and done research in Egypt, Israel, Lebanon and Tunisia.

Music courtesy of the Search for Common Ground.

Credits:
Host: Martin Savidge
Producers: Lisa Biagiotti, Katie Combs and Stephen Puschel

Mexican drug trafficking organizations represent the “greatest organized crime threat” to the United States, according to a recent government report [PDF], and drug-related violence — which has already reached unprecedented levels — is expected to increase in the coming year.

Carol Wise, an associate Professor of international relations at the University of Southern California, joins Martin Savidge to discuss how the abductions and killings in Mexico have seeped across the border into the U.S. and how the incoming Obama administration can work to combat the escalating violence.

See more coverage of the Mexican drug wars, including video interviews and blogs.

Below, read what bloggers are saying about the Obama-Calderón meeting.

The “Security in Latin America” blog writes that the meeting between Obama and Calderón will be all talk and no action.

Worldfocus contributing blogger Greg Weeks argues that details are less important than the tone of the meeting, which he hopes reflects urgency.

The “Pura Vida” blog writes that Mexico should be Obama’s number one security concern, even eclipsing Iraq or Afghanistan.

A blogger at “Mex Files” claims that no one in the Obama administration is interested in or committed to Latin American affairs.

As some of the 2.7 million people displaced by violence in Darfur, the youth faced hunger and alienation, with little future to anticipate. Now, they have formed an outspoken political group known as the “shabab,” Arabic for “young men.”

Mohamed Adam Yahya is a refugee from Darfur and the founder of the Damanga Coalition for Freedom and Democracy, an organization founded to promote the human rights of Darfuris in exile and in Sudan. He speaks with Daljit Dhaliwal about the current situation in refugee camps and about the motivations and future of the shabab.

Many journalists and activists have produced harrowing accounts of the epidemic of sexual violence in Congo. But as intense violence destabilizes North Kivu once again, we thought it was important to reiterate that the pervasiveness of rape is directly linked to the war.

Cases of sexual violence skyrocket during and after battles and along frontlines. Armed groups are deeply aware of the stigma surrounding rape and they exploit it in order to destroy families and bring women — and men — to their knees. The key to finding ways to “Stop Rape” in Congo is not just to increase awareness of rape, but also to increase our understanding of the causes of the war and work to end it.

Which brings us to the men. Men commit most of the violence in Congo, and most of the rapes. But many men are also victims, too — often directly through rape and torture, but also indirectly through what their wives and daughters and mothers experience.

Because they are both perpetrators and victims, more and more women’s organizations work with men, too, to educate and counsel them.

In fact, Georgina and André met with counselors from an extraordinary organization called SOPROP (Solidarite Pour la Promotion Sociale et la Paix) that helps victims of torture and their families. SOPROP offered couple’s counseling to Georgina and André, and though in this case they still separated, SOPROP’s efforts have encouraged hundreds of other families to stay together, empowering the husbands to care for the women in their lives without turning their backs.

Lisa Biagiotti and Bijan Rezvani of Worldfocus.org helped us produce this short interview with SOPROP’s Lydie Suatula to highlight the work SOPROP does in Congo.

Many groups do wonderful work with women who’ve been raped — SOPROP and Synergie des Femmes from this piece are two examples.

You can also support Eve Ensler’s grassroots movement of women — the V-day campaign — as well as Heal Africa. Human Rights Watch and the ENOUGH project also do invaluable research and advocacy on behalf of women and all victims of torture in Congo and elsewhere in the world.

- Michael J. Kavanagh and Taylor Krauss

The Democratic Republic of Congo has endured conflict for more than a decade in what has been called the deadliest war since World War II. More than 5 million people have died and the country is also the site of the largest and most expensive peacekeeping mission in United Nations history.

In the last year alone, more than a million people have fled the fighting in eastern Congo. For more on the conflict, read our Q&A: History, rebels and crisis in eastern Congo.

Worldfocus anchor Martin Savidge hosts a panel featuring a range of voices and perspectives on eastern Congo:

Séverine Autesserre is an assistant professor of political science at Barnard College, Columbia University. She researches civil wars, peace building and peace keeping, humanitarian aid and African politics. Her upcoming book is called Failing the Congo: International intervention and local violence. Before entering academia, Séverine worked in the Democratic Republic of Congo for humanitarian and development agencies.

Nancee Oku Bright currently heads up the United Nations’ Great Lakes team of the department of peacekeeping operations, which covers MONUC and Burundi. She served in MONUC and the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) as chief of the Africa section, as well as chief of the advocacy and public information. A Liberian, she is also the director of the documentary film “Liberia: America’s Stepchild,” which aired on PBS in 2002.

Michael J. Kavanagh is a journalist with the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting who reports about post-conflict development across Africa. He has been reporting on Congo for five years and his work has been regularly featured on Worldfocus.

- See Michael’s reports:     War in DR Congo: The story of Pascal and Vestine
Rape as a weapon of war in DR Congo
- See Michael’s Q&A: History, rebels and crisis in eastern Congo.
- See Michael’s blog post about covering Congo: Giving a human face to Congo’s conflict.

Credits:
Host: Martin Savidge
Producers: Lisa Biagiotti, Katie Combs and Stephen Puschel

The disputed region of Kashmir — a source of tension between India and Pakistan — has seen renewed attention following the attacks on Mumbai. But often the interests of India and Pakistan dominate the discussion of Kashmir.

Worldfocus’ radio show discusses the Kashmiri people, their history and the human rights situation in Kashmir.

Worldfocus anchor Martin Savidge has reported from Kashmir and hosts a panel featuring a range of voices and perspectives on Kashmir:

Mohsin Mohi-Ud Din is a Kashmiri-American who is involved in humanitarian efforts in Kashmir, working independently with the Kashmir People’s Tribunal. Mohsin is a Fulbright scholar to Morocco and the drummer of a Kashmiri rock band Zerobridge. He blogs at the Huffington Post. He currently works for the international Human Rights NGO, Human Rights First.

Haley Duschinski is a cultural anthropologist at Ohio University who travels to Kashmir annually. Her research focuses on violence and war, human rights and transitional justice in Kashmir within the context of the ongoing peace process between India and Pakistan. She answered questions about Kashmir from Worldfocus viewers here.

Azmat Hassan is a career diplomat of 33 years standing and former ambassador of Pakistan, where his postings have included Ambassador of Pakistan to Malaysia, Syria and Morocco, and Deputy Permanent Representative of Pakistan to the United Nations in New York. He is currently on the faculty at Whitehead School of Diplomacy.

Chitralekha Zutshi is a professor of history at the College of William and Mary. She is the author of the book, “Languages of Belonging: Islam, Regional Identity and the Making of Kashmir.” She is currently exploring how Kashmiris see their own past.

Credits:
Host: Martin Savidge
Producers: Lisa Biagiotti, Katie Combs and Stephen Puschel

The United Nations estimates that 3.25 million Somalis, or 43 percent of the population, will require food aid until the end of the year.

The number of Somalis requiring humanitarian assistance doubled in 2008 and continues to climb. Aid workers have also come under fire. As of Oct. 27, 30 aid workers had been killed and another 10 kidnapped.

Zam Zam Abdullahi Abdi once counseled victims of violence at a hospital in Mogadishu run by the Africa Union Peacekeeping Mission in Somalia — coming face to face with women and children who face rape and deadly beatings. She left Somalia after receiving death threats, and now joins Martin Savidge to discuss Somalia’s plight.

Photos by Abukar Albadri

But many countries have replaced paper ballots with electronic buttons and still others have taken their elections online.

In deciding how they will vote, countries weigh the speed, accuracy, anonymity and security of various technologies.

For some nations, electronic voting machines (EVMs) represent a chance at heightened accuracy, as well as increased participation due to accessibility for illiterate voters. Others retain the traditional paper and pencil, concerned that EVMs will open doors for hackers and put the democratic process at risk.

See our other coverage of the 2008 U.S. election and its global impact. The slideshow below shows voting technology in several countries around the world.

Here are some sample ballots [PDF]: Latvia, Ghana, Ethiopia, Brazil, Albania and Congo.

Sample ballots courtesy of The ACE Electoral Knowledge Network under a Creative Commons license. All photos courtesy of Flickr users under a Creative Commons license. Find Worldfocus on Flickr here and contribute your internationally-themed pictures to our collection.

Worldfocus.org reported from Teterboro, N.J. during one of the anniversary celebrations. The German government saluted the veterans who flew over 275,000 flights into Berlin and delivered 2.3 million tons of supplies.

Gail Halvorsen, the original “candy bomber,” recalls post-war life in Germany and explains what made him decide to parachute candy over the skies of Berlin. At the celebration, Halvorsen co-piloted the same 1945 C-54 war plane he had flown during the airlift — this time wiggling his wings over New York City.